Sweeping Zen » Roselyn Stonehttp://sweepingzen.com
The Who's Who of Zen BuddhismThu, 19 Feb 2015 15:23:18 +0000en-UShourly1http://wordpress.org/?v=4.1.1Sei’un An Roselyn Stone Interviewhttp://sweepingzen.com/seiun-an-roselyn-stone-interview-2/
http://sweepingzen.com/seiun-an-roselyn-stone-interview-2/#commentsThu, 24 Dec 2009 15:31:33 +0000http://touchpointe.net/sweepingzen/?p=1491Completed on September 21, 2009 Sei’un An Roselyn Stone is a Zen master with the Sanbo-Kyodan school of Zen Buddhism, the founder and guiding teacher of Mountain Moon Sangha with centers in Canada and Australia. Authorized as a Zen master in the Sanbo Kyodan by her teacher Yamada Koun roshi, Stone began her Zen training ...

Sei’un An Roselyn Stone is a Zen master with the Sanbo-Kyodan school of Zen Buddhism, the founder and guiding teacher of Mountain Moon Sangha with centers in Canada and Australia. Authorized as a Zen master in the Sanbo Kyodan by her teacher Yamada Koun roshi, Stone began her Zen training in Japan in 1977 and had her kensho (“awakening”) confirmed by Yamada-roshi in 1978. Stone has named several successors to date within her sangha. I would like to thank Roselyn for her willingness to participate in this project.

Transcript

SZ: Your “back-story” is pretty interesting. How did you become involved with Zen practice?

RS: I’m assuming you’ve read my “back-story” on the Mountain Moon Sangha website, and know that I sought the opportunity to sit in the zendo as a step in developing a research interest. How that particular interest developed is an even longer story, going back some thirty-five years before that moment. I had no intention of taking up the practice going in. But the second time I sat, which was the next day, I knew I wanted that practice for me—not the professor!

SZ: You were authorized as a Sanbo-Kyodan teacher by Yamada Koun roshi in 1985. Could you tell us a bit about the late roshi?

RS: Yamada Ko’un Roshi demanded precision, truth and respect from his disciples, and gave each of those in return. He knew how to laugh and did so uproariously—especially at his attempts to sing, a popular Japanese pastime. He was light in spirit and he was very clear. By opening his home to his disciples for Zen practice and sesshin he demonstrated that, as beautiful as Zen temples are, one need only simple things for zazen practice: a teacher, cushions, a wall to face, a degree of quiet—even tho’ we were in the middle of a bustling neighbourhood. That was inspirational for me, as temples and church halls were not going to be available to me when I began teaching.

He demonstrated in his own life, as did his wife as well, that serious zazen practice can be carried out in the midst of the “householder” life. When I became his disciple, he was 71 and still traveling to Tokyo daily—getting in early morning practice on the train. He’d then return home, bathe and dine, and come join us in the zendo. Very often he offered dokusan to those non-Japanese disciples who’d arranged time off from their duties back at home to come and work with him for six to eight weeks. Others of us ‘Evening Sitters’ made our homes for extended periods in Japan. I have had some wonderful teachers in various disciplines in a fortunate life, but none compares with him.

SZ: In Japan the Sanbo Kyodan is, more or less, the smallest Zen sect (though one could argue the Obaku is smaller, perhaps). Comparatively, the Sanbo Kyodan—or lineages rooted in the Harada-Yasutani tradition—has often thrived in the West. To what might you attribute this success and could you speculate on why it remains fairly ‘marginal’ in Japan?

RS: One of the contributions made by the Sanbo-Kyodan School to Zen practice, as founded by Yasutani-roshi, can be seen in how it honours the practice of ‘householders’. I prefer this ancient term to that of ‘layman’ or ‘laywoman’ which, in the various Buddhist sects, too often carry an inferior status. Also, the vast majority of Sanbo-Kyodan teachers in Europe and North America are observant Christians—most of them Christian religious; this seems to offer a certain security to many in those countries who wish to practice Zen but who still consider themselves to be observant Christians.

As to why it is still marginal in Japan, as in ‘small’, I can only imagine that perhaps tradition militates against it—the Rinzai and Soto sects being so well developed and having such long histories. That, coupled with the fact that Sanbo-Kyodan derives directly from both, may count for a great deal there.

SZ: That reminds me of a story by Fr. Thomas Hand where he relates Yamada Koun-roshi having said to him something along the lines of, “There is Zen, and there is Zen Buddhism.” If I hear that right, this means you don’t have to give up your religion in order to practice Zen?

RS: “Zen Buddhism” is the institution with all that that implies—with institutional practices and policies. I’d think it would be nigh impossible to be an adherent to it and to some other religion at the same time. Zen is sitting and forgetting ourself. (I’m channeling the Roshi here!) One need not, therefore, give up one’s religion to practice it. However, one will, as the practice deepens, find deeply-held understandings being strongly challenged, e.g. the dualistic notion of God and self. I had abandoned Christianity long before taking up Zen practice but watched as my Christian colleagues in San’un Zendo dealt with this.

SZ: Faith, or Great Faith, is very important in Zen Buddhism. It is said one must have faith in their practice, faith in their teacher. But faith is such a loaded word. For some of us in the West, it automatically suggests Christianity. What is faith, from the Buddhist perspective?

RS: Faith that the practice works and faith that I can realize—that realisation is not reserved for some special elect.

SZ: You are founder and guiding teacher of the Mountain Moon Sangha, with locations in Toronto, Canada and Brisbane, Australia. Tell us a bit about your sangha and what a newcomer might expect to find.

RS: Friendliness, laughter, quiet, resolute sitting. My zendos have been created in homes: some of them dedicated as such, others created on sitting nights by moving furniture and covering cluttered desks with white factory cotton and setting out cushions. The butsudan [‘Buddha shelf’] has Shakyamuni, Bodhidharma, Kannon and the monk Hotei sitting upon it as icons of wisdom, determination, compassion and laughter. The name Mountain Moon Sangha is taken from two of my favourite koans: “Go straight on a narrow mountain road that has ninety-nine curves” (Miscellaneous Collection) and “Carrying my staff across my shoulders, I pay the others no heed and go straight into the thousand peaks” (from Case 24 of the Blue Cliff Record).

SZ: Sei’un An, thank you so much for this opportunity to sit down with you. In closing, what book or books might you recommend to someone interested in reading up on Zen?

RS: I don’t. If you want to know what it’s like to ski, put on the skis and go down the hill; if you’d like to know what Zen is, sit under the guidance of a properly authorized teacher. Three Pillars of Zen gives a pretty good portrait of Zen practise but does not replace getting onto the cushions and presenting oneself regularly to an enlightened teacher for examination.

]]>http://sweepingzen.com/seiun-an-roselyn-stone-interview-2/feed/0Stone, Sei’un An Roselynhttp://sweepingzen.com/seiun-an-roselyn-stone-bio/
http://sweepingzen.com/seiun-an-roselyn-stone-bio/#commentsWed, 23 Dec 2009 20:45:12 +0000http://touchpointe.net/sweepingzen/?p=1261Sei’un An Roselyn E. Stone, Ph. D., was born in St. Thomas, Ontario, Canada. Since her graduation from the University of Toronto she’s lived in five countries (England, Germany, USA, Japan and Australia) and had three professional lives: YWCA physical director; high school teacher of physical education (with a little math and science for good ...

]]>Sei’un An Roselyn E. Stone, Ph. D., was born in St. Thomas, Ontario, Canada. Since her graduation from the University of Toronto she’s lived in five countries (England, Germany, USA, Japan and Australia) and had three professional lives: YWCA physical director; high school teacher of physical education (with a little math and science for good measure); and tenured professor at the University of Toronto where her interest in the phenomenology of human movement forms eventually coalesced into “moving as a mode of knowing: gnosis; dance, sport and exercise as contemplation; Zen. This took her to Japan in 1977 and into San’un Zendo where she would spend most of the next 14 years.

Sei’un Roshi began Zen practice in 1977 on a sabbatical year in Japan. In 1978 her kensho (‘awakening’) was confirmed by her teacher the late Zen Master Ko’un Yamada, of the San’un Zendo in Kamakura. In 1985 Yamada Roshi formally granted her authorization as an authorized Zen Master in the Sanbo-Kyodan Zen Lineage. The teaching name of Sei’un An (“Clearing Away the Clouds”) was conferred upon her at that time. In 1993 and 1994, Mountain Moon Sangha Zendos were established under her guidance in Brisbane and Toronto respectively. For ten years she resided in Brisbane for six months each year, now three months yearly.

Successors

Sei’un An has appointed Mervyn Lander Gô’un Ken, Cecilie Lander Gô’en An, Li-yea Bretz Sei’un An (II), Matthew Love*, Garry Cam, Jean Wilson and Dragan Petrovic* as Teachers in the Mountain Moon Sangha. The Landers have also received appointments as Teacher in the Sanbo Kyodan lineage and have founded the Sun Mountain Zen sangha in Brisbane. Li-yea Bretz (also a Teacher in the Sanbo Kyodan lineage), Matt, Garry and Jean receive disciples in their dokusan rooms at the MMS Hawthorne zendo in Brisbane.

As well, she has named Jan Millwood as Honorary Teacher (she does not accept students).

* These also hold appointments as Assistant Teachers in the Sanbo Kyodan Zen Society.